We're past the worst of the coronavirus crisis - ECB's Lagarde

• "We are probably past the lowest point" of the economic crisis caused by the coronavirus pandemic, ECB President Christine Lagarde said in a webinar this morning. "I say that with some trepidation because of course there could be a severe second wave."
• Europe opened higher on the outlook: FTSE 100 +1.2%; DAX +0.7%; CAC +1.2%; Euro Stoxx 50 +1%.
• "The airline industries, the hospitality industries, the entertainment industries are going to come out of that recovery process in a different shape, and some of them will probably be hurt irremediably. But it will be transformational as well, because there will be industries that will arise from those changes," she added. "We're not going to return to ex ante status quo, it is going to be different."
• To cope with the recession, the ECB in June extended its Pandemic Emergency Purchase Program (PEPP) until mid-2021 and increased it by €600B to €1.35T.
• ETFs: FXE, EUO, OTC:ERO, DRR, ULE, EUFX, URR, DEUR, UEUR, DLBR

Comments

[Djreef1966]

Wouldn’t count those chickens just yet.

[dstb]

Europe’s economies were weak before the virus and were shut down far too long. They will never recover.

[eddie1953]

It might be accurate in Europe but not in the good ole USA plus our wonderful leader now wants to wipe out our health coverage only in America now rings so true..

[dstb]

@eddie1953
Death rates falling. We are well on our way to herd immunity. Europe is not.

[Terry Ballzak]

@eddie1953 RENT FREE

[Jms123543]

@eddie1953 wipe out our health care coverage? I love in Texas and have awesome coverage. Not sure what you’re talking about.

[amw896]

We've seen the worst but we just need to print another 650b euro just in case.....ahhh central bankers, playing taxpayers for idiots for how long now?

[Portus Cale]

The comments here and in other places makes me realize how many miserable people are out there. So many of you only seem to be happy if things are catastrophic and horrible, any good news you dismiss because you just want things to be as terrible as possible.

[FirstFIREWealth_P01135809]

@Portus Cale I'm not sure we're miserable. I think there are just some of us who take advantage of bad news which sometimes sink the markets...and we consider bad news as an opportunity to buy dips. We're not miserable. We're just seeking to build wealth.

[kmi]

No second wave, virology acknowledges that the most susceptible get hit first and hardest, and virus mortalities follow a bell curve. Peak deaths was April 21. Deaths are not increasing.

Worse, deaths are dramatically overreported in the US, with even the CDC admitting "For 7% of the deaths, COVID-19 was the only cause mentioned" - just 7%.

Lots of data in this editorial: issuesinsights.com/...

In NY, people "presumed" to have died of COVID but not tested = 3,700.

"In CA, San Diego County Supervisor Jim Desmond investigated 194 COVID-19 deaths through mid-May and found that only six could be clearly claimed as caused by COVID-19. “We’ve unfortunately had six pure, solely coronavirus deaths — six out of 3.3 million people,” said Desmond."

"in Colorado, where a man found dead in a park with a 0.55% alcohol blood level was declared a COVID-19 victim."

[dstb]

@kmi
Even with all the over reporting of deaths they are still steadily declining. The corrupt media keeps pumping out the absolute case numbers to panic the mindless and sheep. All these people thinking there will be a magic bullet vaccine are going to be seriously disappointed. The virus isn’t going anywhere but we are already developing herd immunity. But the media and CDC will keep focusing on masks instead.

[gregg.coffeecup]

Pelosi will say when it's over....Maybe Nov 3rd

[Irwin R. Schyster]

Famous. Last. Words.

[Kell1776]

The worst is Over says the ECB! We hope! Or maybe not... 😆 no clue.

[bluescorpion0]

the only thing different is now business has to operate under a complete Totalitarian Socialist regime, to the detriment of the human race.

[blacky_]

Free lesson: the opposite of what a central banker says, proves usually to be true.

Europe was in a dire state BEFORE covid. Now the situation only worsened. Tourism is wiped out, the summer season will be a disaster. No preparation for wave 2 was done - there are already spikes in cases. Even without further lock down psychology will be the death sentence for countries like spain and italy, and drag everybody else with it. Just my view.

[johnybg]

@blacky_ What are u talking about man ?
I am European and everything is just fine here. We are dining out and drinking coffee at restaurants for the past 1 month. It’s all good here.
This picture is painted from some crazy American medias.

[Not4Real]

@johnybg don't listen to blacky, I'm in USA and contrary to what the media portrays, people are out in droves here as well. Many are realizing the hoax that this is

[Beelzeboozer]

@Not4Real Yep, tons of imbeciles going out in the USA and calling this a hoax, which is not only idiotic but completely insensitive to people who have lost someone to this virus and to medical professionals risking their health.

Turn off your infotainment network for twits and pull your head out of where it is lodged.

[Micke82]

That's coming from the head of ECB so she's most likely referring to the situation in Europe. And it's true, the European situation is getting better across the board, save for a few outliers such as Sweden.

But let us not give the EU too much credit. The EU leaders made a massive error in judgment by waiting for conclusive evidence on how bad the virus is instead of shutting the borders down as a precautionary measure when the early outbreak happened in China. By the time they had the evidence, the virus had already spread all over the Union. If they had done that with some Black Death Plague type of a virus, it would have been game over there and then for Europe as we know it.

I'm glad that we appear to have beaten the virus but the outbreak also exposed how incredibly vulnerable we would be to a bio-weapon attack. This thing was no killer-bio weapon, if it had been, we would have had no second chance to develop a better response. Live and learn, I hope.

[Youcandothis]

We are very vulnerable to psychological warfare. We might just have been victims of it, by making a lot of harmful decisions based on fear induced by media. We must learn to be much more critical of everything we read and hear, even if it is from scientists. They can also be wrong and they can be corrupted.

[johnybg]

@Micke82 What error n judgement had EU?
We are doing much better than you. Everything is open, I personally drink coffee and eat outside in restaurants every day. No maskS here. 
No BLM bulllshiiit....no American propaganda .

The reason Covid is such a big deal for America is because in general Americans are fat, sick, drinking too much, abusing drugs, have very little culture in personal hygiene etc....so basically God is punishing you for all the bad dees that u did to the world

[Micke82]

@johnybg

Blue on blue situation there mate! I'm a European myself.

And besides, what the heck of an argument that is: "We did better than USA so everything's fine". Yes we did, but Europe didn't become the nice place it is today by comparing ourselves to the worst underperformers in the world and being happy about beating them.

So yes, we did better than USA and we did a lot worse than we could have done.

[Robert Rio]

Not in Florida we're not

[Andrej Chernysh]

She is talking about EU.

[Saint Mark]

LaGarde’s comments were specific to the EU; they have managed the crisis far more efficiently than the US. Our haphazard response will cause our economy to be weak for at least a couple of years, if not a decade or two. Our unemployment rate will be in the low to mid teens for at least the next year and hundreds of thousands of small businesses are shuttered forever. Strap in, invest cautiously, and conserve cash wherever possible.

[Not4Real]

@Saint Mark what exactly was the haphazard response? I'm very comfortable with the response. Including the initial Jan 20 response to shut down all travel to/from China which was deemed racist...

[kmi]

The EU is a composite of its member States which all dealt with COVID differently, some better than others, in the same way the US is a composite of its States where some Governors killed their own people (Cuomo) and others never even shutdown their economy (South Dakota).

Greece and Portugal fared far better than Spain, Italy, and the UK for example.

Some States will exit the crisis better both fiscally as well as in overall mortality, and some will exit it worse. It's already clear that the States with the least competent Governors are trying to lay blame on the Feds while those who follow Federalism and did a better job are not.

Michigan for example with its draconian lockdown had higher mortality than adjacent States without. NY's mortaility per 1,000 is some 10x higher than Florida's, etc.

[jumpnjoey77]

air tight.

[Abusultan]

Be prepare to suffer.

[nb5698]

I totally agree ... Economies are building back up.. stores are open again. We will be normal in a month or 2. Watch the market rip to new highs from here

[Andrej Chernysh]

She is talking about the EU though, not the USA.

[Lunar Thief]

I think the south west of the united states missed the memo

[No Picknic]

Thank you pandemic expert Lagarde.

[1stensland]

A spike up or down would be nice, sideways market isn't much fun.

[Niki Naza]

@1stensland
My option plays using the current elevated volatility premiums / theta levels are saying otherwise :)